


Walk With Me, My Heart

by Razzaroo



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Gen, M/M, Non-Chronological
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 18:51:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16979892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Razzaroo/pseuds/Razzaroo
Summary: "Once, Anders had told himself a lie: that he is a man of his word, who sets a course and sticks to it, no matter the storm. He tells himself that it’s only a half lie, with his head still set straight, eyes on the horizon and unwavering, always searching for freedom."Anders, the men who made him, and the path life takes.





	Walk With Me, My Heart

**Author's Note:**

> You know how sometimes you need to write one thing but then something else comes in and takes over your brain? This is one of those times.

Smoke blots out the stars but Anders knows they’re there, could count them once, could look up and find all the paths that his life could have taken. A whole handful of lives, thrown up at the canvas of sky, blotted out by the choices he’s made in this one. The remains of the Chantry burn, funeral pyre for tyranny. It feels like a finale, a long journey coming to an end it should have reached a long time ago.

Behind him, he hears Sebastian’s low sound of pain and he wants to turn, to heal over the wounds that he caused and can’t touch, the soft aching pieces of himself already preparing to pull him in another direction, back down another road.

Once, Anders had told himself a lie: that he is a man of his word, who sets a course and sticks to it, no matter the storm. He tells himself that it’s only a half lie, with his head still set straight, eyes on the horizon and unwavering, always searching for freedom.

If only hearts were not so easily distracted.

 

* * *

 

**9:19 Dragon**

“What is a friend?” A dark night, a mouthful of cold wine, a fistful of stolen time. Anders is feeling soppy. He presses himself against Karl’s chest, tucked under his chin, “One soul, two bodies.”

“Sounds like lovers to me.”

“You’d know.” Anders taps the count out on Karl’s shoulder, “How many has it been? Ten? Twenty? Face like yours, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

 _Face like yours_ his mouth says; _heart like yours_ his soul says; _soul like yours_ something unidentifiable says, somewhere east of his liver _what a shame it would be to lose it._ Karl only laughs.

“I think you overestimate my charm,” he says, “And my interest.” He sighs, stretches, Anders as unmoving as a cat, and something pops in his back, “And my energy.”

They’ve tucked themselves into a nook in the library, one of the few that are still hidden from the Templars’ cold prying eyes, huddled among candles and dried flowers smuggled from the herbalists, sheltered from cold stone by blankets that smell of sentiment and soft secret love. Anders wishes they could stay like this for all eternity, a single moment trapped in amber and wrapped up in Orlesian philosophy.

“But the whole idea,” he says, “assumes that someone can only have one friend. Having more than one would mean splitting a soul up into more pieces, smaller and smaller. Popular men must have no souls left.”

“It’s a metaphor.” Karl pushes him away, reaches for the wine, “Or it’s nonsense.”

“And it doesn’t account for possession. If I’m possessed, and you have half my soul and I have half of yours, would the demon touch you too?”

Karl wraps Anders up in his arms again, cheek to cheek, stubble against stubble. He smells of wine and it’s intoxicating because it’s _him._

“Philosophers never account for mages,” he says, “We touch the Fade and never have to ask their questions; if they remembered us, they wouldn’t have jobs.”

“Ah, so that’s the reason for the Circle.”

There’s the laugh again, warmer than summer, “One of many.”

All of them nonsense, Anders wants to say, but it catches at the back of his tongue, snagged on the one and only good reason for the Circle to exist: to bring him to Karl and Karl to him, one soul in two bodies, united again where they lie entwined.

 

* * *

 

**9:36 Dragon**

There is something to be said about seeing stars. Anders had learnt to read them once, when he was younger and planning his first escape from the tower, using constellations as way markers to point his path home. It’s proven a useful skill over the years: this constellation hangs over Denerim, jewel of Ferelden, and a pearl of a hiding place; that star points to Amaranthine, your Somewhere Better, your Begin Again; those stars are the way to Kirkwall and Karl and freedom for all.

But the stars in the sky don’t prepare people for their own being knocked askew, their course set astray. Anders has coped with it before, found his way back again, and had hoped that Justice would help fix him in place but he hadn’t accounted for Hawke, open hearted and so very solid. He sets Anders’ heart skipping and sends him reeling into a world of warm arms and soft sheets and gentle, baffling domesticity. Pieces of Anders have made their way into Hawke’s manor over the months, his shirts folded into the same drawers, his glittering collection of amulets on the mantelpiece, his boots side by side with Hawke’s. There’s a place for him in the bed, Hawke dreaming beside him, limbs tangled together, all of it bound together in fine linen sheets.

He wants it so terribly, aching to wrap Hawke in love, red smothering love; he doesn’t want it, all the promises he knows he’ll break, all the danger he puts them both in; he wakes up in the night and wants to be sick.

He buries himself in his manifesto to quiet his heart and Justice’s worries, throws himself into the mage underground. Nothing is said when he commandeers Hawke’s writing desk, hair loose around his face, not realising that the room has gone dark around him.

“Busy man,” Hawke says when he finds him. There’s a kiss pressed to the top of Anders’ head, broad hands on his shoulders, “Tired man?”

Anders can’t remember a time when he hasn’t been tired, the list of causes endless, from Templars to the taint to time ticking away from him, mages’ lives slipping through his fingers like sand. Still, he sets down his pen and rubs his hand across his eyes.

“Stupid man,” he says, tipping his head back briefly so that Hawke can kiss the end of his nose, “I’m sorry. You must think I’ve forgotten you.”

“You could never, even if you wanted to.” Hawke runs his fingers through Anders’ hair, combing it back from his face, “I have something for you.”

“Is it the knight-commander’s heart on a plate?”

“No but you’ve ruined your Satinalia surprise. This is a lot smaller and more practical.”

Hawke kneels beside him and, if Anders were still a romantic young thing, something giddy would have kicked him in the head by now. Still, Hawke’s grin is infectious and Anders can’t help a smile as he prises Hawke’s curled fingers open, red ribbon coiled in his palm.

“Like I said, it’s small,” Hawke says. He plucks at his shirt, dyed deep crimson, as Anders twists the ribbon around his fingers, “But it’s red. And it’s, you know, like in all those old stories. Favours for sweethearts.”

Something warm pulses underneath Anders’ sternum at the mention of a favour, as if he is worthy of this kind of courtly love. He holds it out, an unspoken request, and Hawke takes it, uses it to pull Anders’ hair back.

“One good thing about the Wardens is the uniform is blue,” Anders says, “Red really isn’t my colour. It’s why I never became a senior enchanter.”

“Hm, the multiple escape attempts and trash talking the Circle and the Chantry obviously had nothing to do with that.” Hawke ties off the ribbon and Anders can tell it’s only a clumsy knot. He leans in and there’s soft breath on Anders’ neck, kisses on his jawline, and his heart trips over itself, “I don’t know what you meant before; red suits you just fine.”

 

* * *

 

**Bloomingtide, 9:31 Dragon**

Grateful though he is to be free, Anders does wonder if the Maker is playing some kind of joke on him. He’s free from the Circle but bound by blood to the Grey Wardens, taint burning its way through his veins, ragtag group of people tied together by darkspawn and expectations and a uniform that still feels foreign. Amaranthine itself is not the green haven he’d imagined; it’s grey and windswept, the air thick with salt from the sea, the people’s hearts as sour as spoilt wine.

“Really puts the _grey_ in Grey Wardens,” he says. He gestures up at the sky, “Your doing?”

Gwydion looks and there’s something like a smile tugging at his mouth, “Flattered but no; I don’t have the energy to spare.”

The pair of them are alone, waiting for Nathaniel Howe to surface from his sister’s home and for Oghren to find his way back from the herbalist. Gwydion leans against the city wall, looking very much out of place, with his trim uniform and finely bred cheekbones. He’s not a creature made for this salt soaked place.

“Enjoying the view, Anders?” Gwydion says, his gaze sliding from the crowd to Anders. There’s pride to how he carries himself now, his shoulders back, a lift to his chin that hadn’t been there for about a decade. The wariness that dogged all apprentices is long gone, replaced by quiet wild grown dignity.

Anders likes it.

“Very much so,” he says, “Being a wanted man is good for the soul. Or mine, anyway. What’s your secret?”

Gwydion flexes his fingers, “Always wear your gloves.”

Anders looks down at his bare hands, healer’s hands, and regrets that he will be forever failing step one.

“So why did you decide to not go back to the Circle?” he asks, “They’d have a spot all waiting for you, along with a fancy title. Archmage.”

He doesn’t get an immediate answer. Gwydion stands quiet and watches the thin, wheeling sea birds. For a moment, Anders thinks he’s offended him, said the wrong thing, asked the wrong question, half ready to berate himself for asking such a thing; it should be obvious, to him of all people, why anyone would refuse to go back to the Circle.

“There’s nothing for me there,” Gwydion says, and he lets his cool expression slip, a slight frown creeping between his brows, “At least, nothing I want that they would let me have. Besides, there’s a whole world to change and I’m not done with it yet.”

Anders looks at his gloved hands and wants to put his world and his life into them, more than he has. He hadn’t had any plans past getting out of the Circle and staying out; there had, briefly, been some fleeting hopes of finding Karl but he dashed those against the rocks himself, because Karl’s surely forgotten him by now. Let Gwydion guide him, be a Grey Warden, save the world. He hardly has anything better to do.

“And what is you wanted?” Gwydion asks, and Anders realises that he’s still staring, “When you left the Circle?”

“Me?” Anders tugs at his collar, “I just want simple things: someone pretty, a hot meal, and the chance to shoot lightning at fools.”

 

* * *

 

**9:17 Dragon**

In years to come, Anders knows that he’ll say that Karl saved his life. Karl, who’d picked him up out of the lowest point of his life; Karl, who somehow always has the right thing to say; Karl, who puts aside his own work to make sure Anders doesn’t fall behind. He sits across from Anders, clad in new enchanter gold, something soft and relieved hiding under his facial hair.

“You know, if you made less trouble, you wouldn’t miss so much,” Karl says, and his tone is light, nothing angry or accusatory in it.

“I don’t make trouble,” Anders says, scowling down at Karl’s scribbled notes, “The _Templars_ make it a point to _get_ me in trouble.” He drops the notes, “What’s the point of learning to heal if I’m not actually going to heal anyone?”

“You will.”

Anders huffs and a gust of wind sends the notes spiralling, startles the other apprentices in the library, even rattles one of the high windows. Karl’s expression is crestfallen, coloured by the slightest shade of fear, and Anders can already feel Templar eyes on the back of his neck. He wants to kick himself.

“Just an accident,” he says, twisting to see someone has already stepped forward, helmet up, no doubt ready to drag him in front of Irving and Greagoir, “I didn’t mean it.” He looks back to Karl, gathers up the scattered sheets of paper, “I’m sorry.”

He regrets his magic, because it means he can’t pull Karl close and offer his apologies in affection; he hates that he lives in a world where his magic is something to regret, as if it isn’t part of him, just as his lungs and heart and soul are.

“It’s not just all that, Anders,” Karl says, and his fingers linger against Anders’ hand, “If they think you’re not good enough, they’ll make you tranquil.”

There it is, the albatross across the neck of every Circle mage, threat hanging over the head of every child and teenager in the lower dormitories. Anders looks to see the Templars’ attention has lapsed and he takes the chance to lean over, steals on of Karl’s kisses from under their noses.

“I’ll be good,” he says, “For you. I’ll be good, I’ll keep up, get harrowed and we can spend our golden years drinking terrible wine reserved for enchanters.”

“Golden years?” Karl says, and there’s a smile now, “Here?”

“Dirt becomes diamond when it’s squeezed enough,” Anders says. He wants to fling the table aside, pull Karl close, press him against his ribs, shelter of blood and bone and every sacred thing under the sun, “If they’re going to keep me here, then I’ll take the diamonds I can.”

That night, Anders is roused from his bed and taken to the harrowing chamber, knees cold on the floor, lyrium hot on his tongue, the Fade jewel bright around him.

_It’s starting_

He holds Karl’s name like a promise.

_It’s starting_

 

* * *

 

**Solace, 9:31 Dragon**

There’s an empty space in the arling of Amaranthine, a gap made bolder by Varel’s funeral pyre, hollow at the arl’s right hand. Anders laughs when he hears whispers that he’ll be the replacement, because the idea of him being seneschal of anything is absurd, because it completely overlooks Nathaniel, Amaranthine’s own son and most natural replacement.

Still, it’s Anders who finds himself in Gwydion’s quarters; Velanna has no ear for Circle issues and Justice, living as he does in a corpse, makes for poor company.

“You think mages should break away from the Chantry completely,” he says. He snaps his fingers, “Just like that. Why? Don’t you think that could go badly?”

“No change ever started well. Besides, you know as well as I do that the Circle is hardly good.” Gwydion looks at him and the light from the fire highlights those fine cheekbones, those fine eyes. He paces, every movement proud and elegant; his face is calm but Anders knows that this constant movement is Gwydion’s way of being seen feeling.

“The Chantry doesn’t let go of things easily,” Anders says, “Especially not its excuse to have a standing army.” He coughs, puts on his best impression of the lofty Chantry sisters who’d populated the Circle chapel, “It’s simply not done.”

“I united a warring nation, defeated a blight in a year and survived an archdemon. I don’t let anyone tell me it’s simply not done.”

Anders grins, “You and Justice.” He claps his hands together, links his fingers, “Together, you’d be unstoppable.”

“I don’t think Justice would appreciate you saying that.”

Anders shrugs and helps himself to some of Gwydion’s wine, strong enough to succeed in going to a Warden’s head. He has no love for the Circle, for the Chantry, but the idea of kicking the Divine in the teeth and breaking away had never really crossed his mind before; his escapes had been for him, for his own freedom, his own wants. He couldn’t change the world. His soul isn’t made for it.

“You could do it,” he says, “Change the system, I mean. Tell the Chantry no and make it look easy. You have a talent for it.” He takes a long drink of wine, “I’ll ride your coattails and tell everyone how I inspired you.”

Gwydion laughs then, breathless sound, still broken-boned, “I’ll appreciate your enthusiasm.”

Enthusiasm is an easy gift to offer, one step behind reverence, easier to express than gratitude. There’s a myriad of words he wants to shower on Gwydion, running the whole line from _arrogant bastard_ to _protector_ to something teasing about his red hair. Instead, he settles on one that encompasses them all and more, raising his glass.

“To you,” he says, feeling sentimental, “My commander, my partner in crime, and my friend.”

 

* * *

 

**9:34 Dragon**

Hawke lingers when Anders finishes his stitching, a wound on Sebastian’s arm, not life threatening so not worth the urgency of magic. Sebastian thanks him and grimaces as he does, teeth ground together, through pain or reluctance Anders does not know. Hawke takes his hand and takes him home, leads him up through the dark cellar and into the soft light of the Amell manor, gentle amber, Leandra indulgent of her son’s fancies.

Anders fears he is one of those fancies, despite how tightly Hawke holds him, how warm their hands are together.

He sits in front of Hawke, razor in his hand, blade poised next to the thin skin of Hawke’s throat. He wants to lean in, to press kisses on Hawke’s throat, to press the two of them ( _three of them, with Justice)_ together, meld them into one being because then the Circle couldn’t take Hawke away from him.

“Easy,” Hawke murmurs, “You look nervous. I can do it, if you’re still stressed about today.”

“No,” Anders says, and he feels out of place in his own skin, “I’m all right.”

The razor glides smoothly over skin and soap, directed by a well-practiced hand. He’d done this for Karl before, a way of openly displaying their closeness and intimacy, the way Anders can show his love and be sure it’s understood. Hawke’s hand is on his knee, gentle and oh so heavy in its presence, its reassurance that this is more than just Anders shaving his face.

“So,” Hawke says, “You’re a mage. How did you get so familiar with Sebastian’s armour, to get it off as quickly as you did?”

“Well,” Anders says, and he wraps his legs around Hawke’s hips, “When I was in the Circle, I fucked some Templars for an easy Harrowing.”

Justice rails at him as Hawke splutters. Anders ignores them both and cleans the razor, Hawke’s hands sliding beneath his thighs.

“Really?” Hawke says, “ _You?”_

“No,” Anders says, mouth kicked up into a smile, “I was a Warden, we helped each other with our armour. Sebastian’s isn’t that much different to Nathaniel’s.”

“Oh.”

They fall into silence, punctured by the sound of steel on skin. Justice grumbles, still separate enough that he objects to Hawke, to the distraction he poses. Hawke winds his arms around Anders’ waist, holding him as close as possible, making it awkward to rinse the razor, the splash of water the only sound apart from their breathing.

“There,” he says, finishing the final stroke, rinsing the razor in the basin at his side. He washes the last of the soap from Hawke’s face, one thumb lingering against smooth skin, “Presentable for high society.”

Hawke pulls him close, kisses the hollow of his throat, “Stay with me? The mages of the world can hold on for one more night.”

Anders knows how easily one night would turn into two and then ten and then a month; but he wants it, has wanted it for years, even if it is only for one night and then two and then ten. One hand curls against Hawke’s shoulder, bird boned against the red of Hawke’s tunic. He doesn’t remember how he got so thin.

He chooses to stay.

 

* * *

 

**9:20 Dragon**

Kirkwall is a world away. Anders traces a line from Lake Calenhad, past Denerim and across the sea to Kirkwall; the atlas, old mouldering thing, calls it the city of chains. He knows the Circle there is called the Gallows, that it’s the worst place in the world, and he can’t stand the idea of Karl being there.

“Irving can’t mean it,” he says, and salt chokes him, stings his eyes, clogs his throat. His grip on the atlas tightens enough to pull some pages free, “They can’t take you. They can’t make you leave.”

“They’ll do as they like, Anders,” Karl says, “Apparently, I’ve been _requested._ ”

They’ve met again in that secret corner, still a safe haven, still littered with the leftovers of hundreds of long hidden loves. It had been the first place Anders had gone after he’d heard that the Kirkwall Circle wanted new talent, that Karl was being sent as that new talent; it could add his bitter resentment to all those secrets it had witnessed, his seething anger that one of Kirkwall’s noble children has been brought to Ferelden. Irving’s new red haired favourite is a poor exchange.

“I know that look,” Karl says. He makes Anders look at him, touch gentle, “It’s not his fault.”

“It’s not fair.” Anders feels stupid and petulant, childish, but he holds on to it, “Let Kirkwall keep their own.”

He wraps his arms around Karl’s waist, buries his face in his stomach. He clings, because it’s all he has the power to do in the face of the Templars and the Chantry; Karl loosens his hair from his ponytail, fingers running through. Anders sighs and breathes Karl in, words tangling themselves on his tongue: _I’ll miss you; please don’t forget me; I love you, I always have._

He abandons the day’s research to trail Karl around the tower, unwilling to let even one last moment slip away from them. He hoards every last second, stacked one on top of the other along the ridge of his spine, vertebrae now repositories of memory. When the Templars take Karl away, part of his heart is carved from his chest, leaving only enough to keep him standing and he doesn’t know if and when it will heal. Gwydion Amell huddles with a bundle of other apprentices, slip of a thing drowning in robes cut too long; room to grow, the Chantry sisters say, as if the Circle allows growth. Anders wishes he were a kinder man.

But he’s not. He’s Anders, bitter at the Circle and his whole life of potential dashed against these walls, lost without Karl and so lonely.

It’s a week before he escapes the tower again for the first time in years, eyes turned to the sky, following the stars to Kirkwall.

 

* * *

 

**Justinian, 9:31 Dragon**

Years in the Circle had blunted what Anders thought mages were capable of; he scoffed at stories of mages cracking open the Fade, besieging the Maker’s throne. The Circle doesn’t allow impressive displays of power, never has; bursts of fire and patches of ice are games to gods and no real threat, setting bones and closing wounds with a whisper even less than that.

The Grey Wardens have no such restrictions.

He steps carefully on the thick sheet of ice spreading across the Nest, feeling the cold even through his boots. His gaze is fixed on the enormous spires of glittering ice that have speared the Mother, encased her entirely. The tips gleam black with gore and blight. Gwydion kneels before her, bent on one knee, as if she is a queen and not a darkspawn. He clings to his staff and, even from a distance, Anders can see how tight his grip is, his gloves taut. Magic rolls off him in waves.

“Anders!” Justice calls and Anders stops, turns to see how the entirety of him trembles, the lyrium ring strung around his neck glowing like a star, “Do not touch him.”

Anders wants to wave the words off, to believe that the remains of any spells would pass over him as water, but he can feel the air around him singing with magic, taste winter on his tongue. The feeling of all that power raises the hair on the back of his neck and sends an itch up his spine.

“Amell,” he says, kneeling in front of Gwydion, setting his own staff down against the ice. A spell to send all that power reeling back into the Fade burns on his bare fingers, “Gwydion.”

“No,” Gwydion says, and he looks up. He sees past Anders and his expression gives nothing away about how he feels about his handiwork. His hands tighten further on his staff, “I’ll be all right.”

He breathes in and the magic draws back, winter’s cold lifting like a shroud. He shudders and it’s now that Anders realises exactly why he needs a specialised staff, designed to be a lightning rod, turn his magic away from the people around him, back into the earth and down into his own soul.

“You didn’t even need our help,” Anders says, standing, allowing Gwydion to use him as an anchor, “Absolute force of nature.”

Gwydion says nothing. The colour slowly comes back to him as he reins his magic in, draws it back under his control, exercising years of restraint, before he straightens his back and turns to Justice and Nathaniel. Anders wishes he could bottle this moment, tip it out in front of the Chantry and Templars, proof that mages can control their own magic, that it only needs training instead of scrutiny and brutality. He stands and stares at those ice spires, at the grace of them. Gwydion’s hand lands on Anders’ shoulder, drawing him away.

“Come on,” he says, not even sparing a glance at his own handiwork, “We’re done here.”

 

* * *

 

**9:37 Dragon**

Anders has never felt safe entering a Chantry; it is, he thinks, a feeling common to all mages, the realisation that even their Maker doesn’t want them. It’s no safe haven but it is the one place Hawke can go to where people won’t talk to him, so Anders follows his footsteps, the ringing bell of his heart calling Anders to prayer. He finds Hawke in the martyr’s chapel, a small alcove of plain white stone, slumped on his knees before a stone Andraste.

“Hawke,” he says, halfway to choking, fearing that this is Karl all over again, “Garrett.”

Hawke lifts his head and Anders’ heart sits sick and heavy in his windpipe, half expecting to shrivel in the face of another Tranquil brand. He allows himself the smallest sigh of relief when he doesn’t see a red sunburst. There’s a bruise building on Hawke’s cheek, livid and dark. Anders wishes he couldn’t call it _just_ a bruise.

“I want to say it’s worse than it is,” Hawke says, “But I can’t lie in the house of the Maker.”

“What happened?”

“Running my mouth in front of a Templar finally got the better of me.” Hawke presses his forehead against the Andraste in front of him, “Oh, to be made of stone, like she is. It would be easier, not to feel.”

“She wasn’t always made of stone,” Anders says, and he beckons for Hawke to lift his head, “She was flesh and blood once, and felt injustice like anyone does.” Hawke rests his injured cheek against Anders’ hand, relaxes against the wave of healing magic, “What did Meredith want?”

“For me to find some runaway mages for her.” Hawke closes his eyes, “I either do it or the Templars kick down my door. It’s hardly a choice.”

“We’re mages.” Anders runs his hand along the line of Hawke’s jaw, “What choices we’re given are never fair or easy.”

“Easier to bear, with you,” Hawke says, “As most things are.”

He takes Anders’ hands in his and presses them to his mouth, kisses like stars against Anders’ knuckles. Anders is relieved that Hawke is here and whole in front of him, looking at him as if he is the world. He wishes he could offer the benediction Hawke is looking for. All he has to offer is his heartbeat, drumming a countdown to the day he can look at Hawke and say _now we are free._

“They won’t do it again,” Anders says as Hawke rises, hands still clasped together, “I promise.”

Hawke pulls him in close, and he rests his chin on Hawke’s broad shoulder. His eyes meet those of the stone Andraste, woman destined for the flame, and he wonders if she’d expected the fire and what had come after. He wonders if she’d feared it.

 

* * *

 

In time, Anders comes to learn that the roads men walk are not determined purely by their own souls, that it’s not their own lonely hearts crying out for companionship that lead them astray. It’s the men they walk with who lead them down different paths, a hand reaching out when it’s needed most ( _Karl in the Circle; Gwydion in Amaranthine; Garrett in Kirkwall and every wild place that came after)_ to be a guide to journey’s end.

When Anders receives the letter from the Inquisition, it’s another hand on the choices that map out his life, a clean cut in emerald that takes Hawke away from him. Hawke’s own letter comes to him a week later, red ribbon coiled inside, and Anders stands on the brink of the future. Uncertain, he stretches a hand out into the dark. There, he finds Fenris, pulling him from the end of this journey and on into the next.


End file.
